clair055

  Do you know what these are? If you guessed dental tools you would be correct? Now, who owned them? None other than America’s silversmith and favorite son of Liberty who rode the countryside warning the folks that the British were coming.   No…not William Dawes, but that other one.   Yes, old what’s his name? Yes!   Paul Revere! Following the French and Indian War the economy in the colonies had been what is described by some today as an economic downturn. Actually, folks were really hurting financially. Not only did the colonies take a hit with the French and Indian War there was something called the Stamp Act that severely impacted Paul Revere’s business. With creditors after his property and no orders coming in for his metal working Revere turned towards dentistry. Seems logical. Right? A surgeon staying with a mutual friend taught Revere some of the tricks of the trade. Yes, five years before his midnight ride the following ad appeared in the Boston G...

Boom and bust – basic social studies vocabulary words, right?   Think about how you learned these words.   I would imagine you were taught about boom and bust during an exploration of the Gold Rush, right? Most everyone is….and that’s my point.  Are there other situations where the terms boom and bust could be used?  Of course there are, and recently I stumbled across one that I found really interesting via a friend.   Let’s examine Fruithurst, Alabama – a rural little hamlet near the Georgia border in Cleburne County.   As far as population goes most elementary schools have a larger student body than Fruithurst’s total population.  The 2000 census indicates the population tops out at a whopping 200 people.  If we transported ourselves back to 1890 and the area where Fruithurst is located we might be lucky if we found 200 people. In fact, the area wasn’t even known as Fruithurst in 1890.   The area was first known as Summit Cut...

So....little Johnny or Susie brings home a teacher prepared worksheet filled with several math problems for homework.  At some point a parent decides to check the answers or at least review  the sheet to see what type of assignment had been given. Some of the problems are troubling: 1. "Each tree had 56 oranges.  If eight slaves pick them equally, then how much would each slave pick?" 2. "If Frederick got two beatings per day, how many beatings did he get in one week?" Yes, I'm serious.   This actually happened recently in a Georgia classroom per    this link . I hope you have a problem with these questions.  I certainly do, and I applaud the parents in this situation for complaining. Why would teachers include such insensitive questions within a math assignment? The spokesperson for Gwinnett County Schools advised the teachers were trying to provide students with a cross-curricular activity by incorporating social studies lessons into the math problem...

The television show Grey’s Anatomy has made the word seriously a go to word when shocked, surprised, angry, etc. as seen in this video: I’ve even been known to use it myself, so when a friend sent me the following pictures I started thinking about the concept of the word serious and its connotations regarding the field of education. These pictures show a different kind of airline, don’t they? The labeling on the plane reminds me of primary elementary classrooms where the teacher labels everything,and the classroom itself becomes a functional word wall….. desk, chair, television, computer, etc. These are photos of a South African plane belonging to Kulula Airlines …. To say they do things different at Kulula is an understatement. Here are a few statements you might hear if you are a Kulula passenger: On a Kulula flight, (there is no assigned seating, you just sit where you want) passengers were apparently having a hard time choosing, when a flight attendant announced, "People, peop...